Mirror Image
by Witchy Bee
Summary: Some of their demons were literal, others were not.


**Title: **Mirror Image

**Summary: **Some of their demons were literal, others were not.

**A/N:** I've been inspired by some of the random party banters recently, so I decided to write this. I included the dialogue from the game as well, so I can't take credit for it. I may do a series of ficlets like this one since there is quite a bit to work with. Let me know what you think and if you'd be interested in reading more.

)O(

It astonished him how someone so very pure, so innocent in every other way, could be so utterly stupid as to look a demon in the eye and believe the lies it fed her. Merrill seemed like such a good person, too, a good mage. She had only wanted to cling to a little piece of her people's history. But they say the road to the Void is paved with good intentions.

Part of him still wanted desperately to cling to his own notion that she was just a naive girl who had gotten in over her head, like he had. Merrill didn't understand many things, least of all the complex inner workings of the Fade and the spirits and demons that dwelled there. They made a game of fooling dreamers and the unwary mage.

"You really believe, don't you?"

"What are we talking about?" he asked, frowning.

"Believing," Merrill said sincerely. "You do; I can tell, in freedom, in mages, in good spirits and bad templars. With more fire than the sun."

"And your point is?" Anders demanded. This conversation was beginning to irriate him, like a lot of things did these days.

"I miss it sometimes." she said, "Things being certain."

"Some things are certain." he said.

She shook her head sadly. "Not anymore."

Andraste's flaming knickers, who was he to judge her, really? He envied her, and she admired him. Anders stood for freedom; that was true. He believed with every fiber of his being that every mage deserved a chance to prove they could be trusted. And yet, he had become everything the templars feared. But he needed Justice as much as the spirit needed him.

What angered him so was that Merrill had consorted with a demon on purpose, fully aware of what she was doing, forever throwing away her chance to show the world that not all mages were maleficarum, and for what? What was the price? Did she even know?

In truth, he wanted to protect her, to save her from this kind of guilt. But perhaps that was what it would take to open her eyes. Still, he must try, if only to save himself from having one more damn thing to regret later, because he saw in her a reflection of who he once was.

"It's not a good feeling, you know."

"What?" Merrill asked wearily, dreading yet another tiring and ultimately pointless argument.

"Being an abomination," he said, then added bitterly, "I just got a taste of your future."

"I'm not that foolish." the Dalish elf responded defensively. "Our relationship is, um, strictly platonic."

But he continued. "It's like you're trapped in your own body, seeing out your eyes, while someone else moves you like a puppet. And you're trying to scream, to move a single muscle, but there's no escape...until you look down at the blood on your hands."

"Stop it." Merrill's eyes were wide. "You're scaring me."

"That's the point." Anders snapped.

Yes, he knew by now what it felt like to lose control. He was trying to help her, and in some twisted way, to redeem himself. He was giving her the warning he had heard a thousand times but never truly listened to because he never believed it would happen to him. It made sense, when Anders permitted himself to think about it; of course a demon would try to gain his trust first.

And now he, or Justice, had tried to destroy the very thing they were fighting for. The mage called him a demon, backing away in fright as she laid eyes upon the very same monster she could potentially become. If Hawke hadn't been there to calm him and explain to the poor girl that he was not an abomination, but merely a deeply troubled man...

"Are you all right?" Merrill touched his arm gently; he resisted the urge to pull away.

"I nearly killed an innocent girl, how could I be all right?"

"I'm sorry." she said. People sometimes said that generally when terrible things happened, but he had a feeling that she meant it.

"You're sorry? For me…?" he asked, baffled. "This could be you! You could be the next monster threatening helpless girls!"

"Anders..." For a moment, she was very quiet, but then the blood mage began to speak in a tone he'd never heard from her before. "There's no such thing as a good spirit. There never was. All spirits are dangerous. I understood that. I'm sorry that you didn't."

He was sorry, too, but all the sorrow in the world did not change a single thing.

It left him speechless. He envied her, because she still had time, one last chance to see the error of her ways before it was too late. Anders had wanted to be a good example for mages everywhere. We don't always get what we bargained for. They were living proof of that.


End file.
